Souls Beneath
by Tempestt
Summary: During a hunt gone wrong Dean is taken by a maniacal poltergeist. Now his family must rescue him before it's too late. Hurt!Teen!Dean. Rated for creepiness.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own or make a profit from Supernatural. Many thanks to Starliteyes for taking the time to look this over for me.

For Vanessa at SFTCOL(AR)S, who wanted to see a story of why Dean was afraid of rats.

**Souls Beneath**

_Day One_

They were deep in southern Georgia, the thick mid-summer heat pressing down on them until it felt like they were swimming in bathwater. The air smelled sweet with decay and the kind of sweat that clings with you no matter how much you shower. It seemed to John that they spent a lot of time in the south. It was dank with old memories and rotten with nearly forgotten sins. There were so many spirits steeped into the countryside that the folks accepted them as part of the natural scenery. But they weren't natural---staying on after your time had a way of moldering your soul until it stank as bad as spoiled peaches left to ferment in unpicked groves.

They were carefully creeping along the upper floors of a long abandoned plantation, the air thick with dust. The wilderness was slowly creeping in, violently taking back what it used to own by right of nature. Silken vines strangled the Ionic columns that stood like decommission soldiers lined up for one last inspection. Mosses sunk in low from the thick-limbed trees that stood sentential over the once beautiful and ancient architecture, obscuring the bloated, white plantation behind green and yellow vegetation.

One hundred years ago, Ezra Cane had gone insane and had stalked through the well-groomed orchards and plowed farmlands, searching for new victims to capture and torture. Rumor said that it all started when his wife ran away with her black lover, taking Ezra's four year-old daughter with her. Their abandonment drove the old man to kill his friends and neighbors or anyone else who dared to wander onto his lands. Finally the townsfolk had enough, and they stormed his plantation. They strung him up by the neck on the front lawn, and after he stopped kicking, they cut him down and burnt him to ash.

It was a mystery to John, why still, after all these years, people were turning up missing. As far as he could figure, there had to be something left behind in the house that Ezra was hanging onto. Something that John had to find and destroy before another innocent person paid the price for the spirit's insanity.

They had methodically searched every inch of the crumbling house, until finally hours later they had reached the third floor. The wooden floorboards were weak and John didn't have to remind his well-trained fourteen year-old son to walk close to the walls where they were the most stable. However, that didn't stop the almost uncontrolled urge to do so as he watched Dean at the far end of the hall, his shot gun held nose down, ready to fire at a moment's warning.

His son was mad at him in a way that only a teenager could be. John hadn't wanted to bring Dean along on this particular hunt. They were dealing with a poltergeist, and it was a known fact that they fed on a teenager's natural angst. There was something about the hormonal imbalance of a growing body that made most spirits go bat shit, and if there was anything that John was sure of, it was that his fourteen year-old was definitely having some hormone issues.

The boy had just recently discovered girls with a ferocity that almost stunned the grown man. Dean had always been aware of his boyish charms on women when it came to getting something he wanted, like information or a second helping of pie. But in the last few months his son had figured out that the fairer sex had other uses than cooking. John was fairly certain that the boy hadn't acted on it yet, but he knew it was only a matter of time. Dean was nothing if not a fast learner.

It was for that reason, which John had told Dean to stay home that day. Someone as emotionally charged as Dean would be a beacon for a vengeful spirit on the hunt. Dean of course hadn't seen it that way. He thought John was punishing him for some small mistake or error in judgment. His son hadn't outright questioned his decision, but if the glare that Sammy sent his way was any indication, then John had seriously damaged Dean's fragile ego.

Even though there was no outright dissention in the ranks, the silence emanating from his sons was enough to break any man, and John had relented and allowed his eldest to join him on the hunt, leaving Sam home to do more research.

Dean was stopped in front of a solid wooden door, ready to push it open and step to the side. John called out a warning for him to be careful of the rotted floorboards directly in front of the door. Dean paused in the act of reaching for the knob, his eyes swinging towards John.

Without warning the door was wrenched open of its own volition, revealing a black maw of nothingness. The barrel of Dean's gun jerked up and he twisted around to face the threat. John watched stunned as a multitude of arms shot out of the darkness, long gnarled fingers scrabbling for purchase around Dean's waist and legs. Some of the arms were pale, almost gray with rot, while others were dark and ashy. Some were stick-thin and childlike, while one set was brawny with a man's strength.

They grabbed a hold of Dean and yanked, pulling the boy off his feet. Instinctively, he dropped his gun, his hands clawing at the door frame to keep from being sucked into the darkness.

John dropped into a crouch, hugging the wall as he sped down the hall, carefully putting one foot in front of the other on the most stable portions of flooring. Dean's panicked eyes held onto his father's, the only connection he had across the distance. Dean slipped further back, and his nails left long claw marks in the soft mahogany on either side of the door.

John was close enough to see the whites of his son's eyes, when his fingers gave way and he was yanked into the darkness with an aborted scream of terror. The door slammed shut as John reached it, nearly breaking his nose with the impact. He pounded his shoulder against the old wood, feeling it shudder under his weight. It gave way with a crack as it tore from the ancient hinges and fell backwards into the room.

It was an old sewing parlor, with large bay windows that were mostly broken out. Something fluttered in the rafters above his head, and John looked up to see a flock of nesting birds. The room faced a western exposure, well lit and clearly empty.

"Dean!" His tone demanded an immediate answer, but he received nothing in return.

John's voice boomed in the room, and the flock of birds scattered out the windows with loud screeches of dismay at being disturbed. He tore the room apart looking for hidden passages or forgotten cubbies. Too quickly it was apparent that there was no other way out of the room except for the way he came, and the window ledge that was three stories up.

"Dean."

John choked on the word, wondering if he would ever be able to say that name again without swallowing ashes.

666

Dean wasn't a lazy boy, but truth be told, he would rather wake up slowly in a nice soft bed than to jerk upright at the sudden influx of shooting pain at the tips of his fingers and the soft fleshy parts of his lips. He noticed immediately that there were warm, furry bodies flooding over his chest and face, suffocating him with their wet, musky stench. He gasped for air, as they tumbled down around him, squealing in protest.

He came up fast, and when he hit the ceiling with his forehead, he fell back even faster. He could taste blood on his lips, and pain starburst behind his eyes at the knock he took. He struggled to focus his eyes, but he was enveloped in complete darkness, so thick that he couldn't even see his hand in front of his face. Beneath his back he could feel something sharp and angular jab uncomfortably into his ribs. He sat up gingerly, slumping against a cold, damp wall when he realized that he couldn't sit upright fully.

The half-starved rodents that had blanketed him, scurried away, but Dean was still freaked at the sensation of their filthy little bodies covering his. He checked his pockets quickly, wincing when the tips of his fingers brushed the rough fabric of his jeans. He found his small flashlight that he always kept with him, switching it on so he could see his surroundings.

The first thing he checked was his fingers. His nail beds were cracked and crusted with blood and he could see where a few of them had been bent completely backwards. There were longs slivers of wood shoved underneath his nails, piercing deep into the quick of his fingers painfully. He knew those wounds were the result of him struggling to escape the arms that had yanked him through the doorway and away from his father.

In addition there were small puncture wounds in the webbing of his fingers and the fleshy part of his palm. The bottom of his stomach dropped out when he realized that they were small bite marks. He brushed his hand over his lips, feeling ragged tears of flesh, and freshly oozing blood. The squeals of rats ricocheted off the damp walls around him, attacking him with sound instead of teeth. Dean kicked out his foot, connecting with a fat body, and sent it flying.

The rat darted away and Dean followed it with his penlight. It disappeared into a tiny crack in the wall near his feet. Dean scanned the area, trying to swallow down the tide of panic that swelled deep and terrible inside him.

He was crammed into a tiny cubby hole built of cement. It was tall enough to let him sit in a half-slumped position and just long enough for him to lie down. He barely had any room to move side to side, and besides the small hole where the rat disappeared into, the walls were seamless with no exits that Dean could see.

Something round and smooth was nestled in his spine and he shifted so he could scan the floor. Ivory colored bones littered the floor around him. He immediately indentified a couple of femur bones and several ribs. Stacked to the side he saw two skulls, the round empty sockets of one staring back at him woefully.

He twisted his arm behind him, digging out the third skull that was pressing against his back. His panic surged when he realized that it was the skull of a child, no more than three or four years old. Dean tossed it away where it landed with the others, trying not to think too hard on the matter.

Dean could see where most of the bones had been gnawed down to the marrow by small teeth. Another rat ventured through the hole and Dean lashed out at it viciously. His aim struck true and it bounced off the wall, and fell still on the floor.

Dean felt a flood of victory at the sight, and his panic lessoned a little. There was no reason for him to worry. He wasn't about to end up as rat food like the unfortunates that he shared the tomb with. His father would be looking for him, and John would find him, Dean had no doubt in the world. His Dad was the best hunter out there, and there was no way that he was going to let some two-bit, piece of crap, wanna-a-be Freddy Kruger snatch his kid.

Slowly, Dean cleared away the bones beneath him, piling them against the walls so he could lie back comfortably without being jabbed in the ribs. All he had to do was sit back and wait. His Dad would be digging him out soon enough, and then he could get back to the business of salting and burning the dickweed that had been disappearing people who wandered onto his property for the last hundred years.

As much as Dean trusted in his dad, he wasn't completely oblivious to the seriousness of his situation. It could take a while for his father to find him, and he had limited resources on hand. He had a flask of holy water in his pants pocket, a hunting knife in his boot, some salt, a lighter and his flashlight. The water would last him about two days if he rationed it carefully, but the flashlight would barely last a few hours if he kept it on constantly.

Right now the rats were kept at bay by the torch, but as soon as the light went out they would come flooding back. Dean could hear them behind the wall, squirreling around and squealing with hunger. Carefully, with the toe of his boot, he nudged one of the skulls over to the small crack in the cement, wedging it tightly into the hole. It wouldn't hold against the rats if they tried to nose their way in, but if he kept the sole of his foot pressed against the skull, it would keep the hole plugged. To do so he had to lay prone on the cold cement slab. Laying back left him feeling vulnerable, but it was a trade off he was willing to make.

The air around him smelled rich with wet mold and decay. The coldness that seeped into his bones from the cement flooring and the weight of the air around him, spoke of being deep underground, beneath damp earth and twisting roots. Dean tried not to panic at the knowledge that he was buried alive. He closed his eyes, and breathed through his nose, exhaling out his mouth. It was an exercise that his father taught him to deal with stress. He tried to imagine himself on a sun-soaked beach, waves lapping at his toes with beach bunnies bouncing around in string bikinis.

As soon as he had a handle on his emotions, he clicked off the flashlight. The darkness crashed down on him like a tidal wave. Even though his eyes had been closed, the darkness had not been as complete as it was now. Dean felt something heavy press against this chest, and he fought to drag a lungful of air into his body. His pulse raced, and the sound of the rats behind the walls intensified until it sounded like they were digging in his ears.

His hand trembled and he clenched his fingers tightly around the torch. He wanted desperately to turn on the light, but the hard resolute voice of his father echoed in his head. He knew it was better now to accustom himself while he had the choice, rather than to wait until the light went dead and he was left in uncompromising darkness.

He breathed deeply, counting in his head like his father taught him. He tried to reclaim his beach fantasy, but he could no longer hear waves, just his harsh panting and the scurrying of rats. He felt the round press of the skull beneath his foot shift, and he locked his knee holding it tight against the flood of rodents that were trying to invade the small space that he claimed for himself.

Dean screwed his eyes shut, pretending that he was lying in his own bed trying to sleep. The fantasy was compromised when he realized that the sound that had lulled him to sleep for the last ten years was absent. Sam was safe at home, and Dean was thankful for that, but at that moment he would give anything to hear his brother's soft snoring.

Sam never could get a handle on the idea of stealth sleeping. While John had drilled into them the importance of sleeping with one eye open and as silently as possible, Sam had shrugged off his father's words, claiming that it was impossible to control one's body when they were unconscious. His disregard for his own safety while sleeping had led Dean to take up the slack. He slept with the Bowie his Dad had given him under his pillow, his senses stretched taut even in unconsciousness. While asleep he could sense a shift in the air if the door opened across the house, or hear the slightest creak of a footstep on the floor.

Dean did prefer to awaken slowly in the comfort of his own bed, but it rarely happened. Instead he stood vigil over his sleeping brother, guarding him twenty-four seven, without Sam's knowledge. Dean didn't resent his brother for that, in fact, he felt that it was his right. He was the oldest, the strongest, and no matter what Sammy said he was the wisest. It was his duty to make sure that his little brother was safe and protected. And if part of protecting him meant that Sam never knew that terrible things didn't stop just because he was asleep, then Dean was fine with that. Let his little brother sleep peacefully-- it was one of the few meager things that Dean could give him.

Eventually, with every breath the hard knot of fear that was forming in the center of Dean's chest loosened. The knowledge that Sam was far away from the spirit's clutches calmed him. Dean thought back to that morning's breakfast that he had shared with his brother. They had squabbled over the last bowl of Lucky Charms, an argument that Dean had won of course. Dean forced his brother to eat eggs and bacon instead, a far healthier meal than a bowl of pure sugar. Sam thought his brother was being a dick, but that was okay. Dean had eyed the last two eggs on Sam's plate and absently thought that he should be having some protein himself before the hunt, but he knew that his brother needed it more. He was still growing and all.

Once the row had been settled, Sam had fallen into the rhythm of his habitual nonstop chatter that drove their father absolutely bonkers and which Dean had learned to tolerate over the years. That morning's topic had been epics and the saga of Beowulf. Apparently, his ten year-old freak of a brother found the Viking sagas to be far more interesting that Shakespeare's tragedies. How or why a ten year-old would have read either or even compared the two was completely beyond Dean. Sometimes he wondered if Sam was adopted, or the product of an alien experiment or something, because there was just no way that they were in any way related. Dean caught the look on his Dad's face as Sam rattled on about the differences between translated prose and iambic pentameter, and knew that his father was thinking the same thing.

Dean sighed as he adjusted to the weight of the darkness that surrounded every inch of his body, and ignored the distant squeal of rats. Instead he allowed himself to construct the story he would tell Sam when he got home that night. Of course he would tell Sam about how brave he had been as he laid in his tomb of rats and bone. Maybe he would exaggerate the story a bit, tell Sam how fiercely he fought against the ghost as it dragged him down the hall, kicking and screaming as Dean busted holes in the walls and yelled imaginative curses that would make a nun's ears bleed. This was definitely a story he was going to have to tell to his brother as they sat under the covers, their Dad in the other room fast asleep.

He could imagine Sam's little snickers as he cracked off wise-ass jokes and his gasps of awe as Dean acted out how he fought off the spirit and won. He couldn't wait to terrify his brother with the description of giant man-eating rats and their long yellow teeth and sharp claws.

Dean was just composing the end of his story, figuring that he could tell Sam that he dug his way out of the ground with his bare hands, breaching the surface like some sort of zombie out of Dawn of the Dead when he realized that something was wrong.

The air around him had grown cold, but his body was already numb with the dampness that penetrated his bones from the cement slab he reclined on so he had barely noticed. He opened his eyes, but the deep, impenetrable darkness remained the same. He shifted his face to the side, staring at where the wall should be. It took him a moment to realize that the constant scurrying and squealing of the rats had fallen silent. The stillness of the air around him should have been complete, but it was broken by an awkward, rasping sound.

Dean inhaled, his breathing coming in short, barely controlled pants. The sound was harsh against his ears, and it took him a moment to realize his breaths weren't the only ones he heard. Someone was breathing heavily against his right ear, their exhalations panicked and grating.

Dean jerked away, colliding with the mound of bones next to him as he stared wide-eyed into the darkness. He flicked on the light, blinking as his pupils contracted painfully under the glare. He glanced at the wall next to him and the emptiness of space. He swallowed hard, panning the light around the small cubby.

As the light reached the wall where the two skulls had previously been stacked, Dean paused, his hand trembling. On the wall was a dark, viscous stain that writhed with small white specks. Dean was positive that it hadn't been there before he had turned out the light. He leaned a little closer, and he could smell the taint of rotting blood in the air. Maggots slithered through the ooze that was thick and tacky, their fat little bodies making sticky sucking sounds as they fed.

Dean drew back in disgust. In his panic he had forgotten to keep his foot pressed against the skull he was using to block the hole, and suddenly a plethora of rats spewed into the tiny room. Dean snarled, drawing his feet back and kicked. They squealed and danced around his legs, running into the piles of bones around him and scattering them on the ground. Dean flailed, knocking them against walls, and crushing them with his booted feet. Their eyes gleamed red in the torchlight, and Dean tried not to think about Hell Hounds and demon kin.

They retreated through the hole, a half a dozen less than what had rushed him. Dean's lips curled back as he scraped their little corpses across the floor with his feet, cramming them back through the hole with his toes. He pushed the skull into place, pressing his foot tight against the angular protrusion of cheekbones and sinuses. Small blood spatters smeared across the walls and floor where he had crushed them, and he automatically checked on the large stain. It was gone, along with the squirming maggots that had been feeding on it.

He laid back, wide eyes staring blankly at the gray ceiling above his head. He should have expected the spirit to pay him a visit. He hadn't expended all that energy to nab him, just to dump him in a hole and leave him. Of course, it would want a little play time. It had never been clear what Ezra Cane had done to his victims. All anyone knew was that people disappeared forever if they ever stepped foot on his property. Now, it was pretty obvious to Dean that he had buried people alive in different plots around the property, leaving them to choke on their own panic until finally dying of thirst or oxygen deprivation.

It was a terrible, horrible way to die. Not at all how Dean imagined he would meet his maker. He always imagined it would be in a blaze of glory, like the Bon Jovi song. Billy the Kid was a true outlaw hero. Too bad he was shot down by his best friend. That was a lesson that Dean took to heart. You could only ever rely on family, and at the moment Dean was betting heavily on his father to get him the hell out of there.

Dean did his breathing exercises and tried to relax his muscles. His hand trembled when he finally turned off the light. He wanted to think about anything but where he was, but his senses were attuned to every little sound that echoed in the small tomb. There was no way he could get back to the eye of calm that he had been at before.

Dean was brave. He was strong. There was nothing that he couldn't handle, but at the moment, he really, really wanted his Dad.


	2. Chapter 2

Thank you to Starliteyes for taking the grammar ruler to my knuckles. Man, comas are the bane of my existence—rat b---ards.

**Souls Beneath**

_Day Two_

The crypt smelled of urine, rot and death. The fullness of Dean's bladder had overwhelmed him sometime in the night, and he had rolled to the side, unzipping his fly to piss on the pile of bones stacked against the wall. For a split second he recoiled at the thought of desecrating the bones of Ezra's other victims, but the need to pee was undeniable, and he had no choice.

Thirst scratched the back of his throat, and Dean tried to drum up enough spit inside of his mouth to swallow. He licked his lips and tried not to flinch at the sharp flecks of pain that radiated to the back of his mouth and into his molars. He tasted blood on his tongue, and felt small crusty scabs forming at the creases of his mouth.

He allowed himself one small sip from his flask. The water was nearly half gone, but if he was thrifty he could make it last at least another day. Hunger roared in the pit of his stomach, but it wasn't debilitating. It felt more like he had been sent to bed without dinner and now he was ready for a big breakfast, complete with sweet, sticky pancakes and crispy fried bacon. He wished now he had eaten those eggs he had given Sam instead of the bowl of Lucky Charms. They would have stayed with him longer, and helped to nourish his already depleted body.

Another shiver wracked him, and he pulled his arms inside his thin tee-shirt and crossed them over his chest to try and trap what meager warmth he could in his body. As the hours wore on and he lay on the damp cement, he sucked in more of the surrounding coldness until his skin turned icy. His body ached, and the muscles lining his spine felt tight with strain.

The passage of time was meaningless to him, but he knew that he had been beneath the earth for at least a day. He hadn't been able to sleep, his senses too keyed up to relax, but now the weight of fear and exhaustion was starting to drain him.

He had a lot of time to think in the dark, and he counted the number of Ezra's victims over the years. There were close to two hundred as far as Dean could remember, with at least three bodies to a grave more or less. That would mean that there were approximately thirty-three graves on Ezra's property. Dean wondered if they were all connected together, a loose knit collection of tombs spreading beneath the earth like tunnels. That was just a guess though. For all Dean knew, Ezra could be dumping them all in one huge mass grave, leaving them to rot amongst rat gnawed corpses.

Dean shuddered and withdrew into himself even further. He had flicked on his lighter earlier and searched the walls of the tomb, watching carefully for the sputtering of flame that told of a passageway out. When he neared the crack in the wall, the flame had danced, but Dean didn't know if it was from an influx of oxygen or just the movements of the rats as they tried to breach his defenses.

Several times throughout the night he thought about taking up one of the sharp rib bones littering the floor around him and widening the hole in his tomb until he could squeeze through. The rats had to have come from somewhere. They just didn't spontaneously spawn.

Only doubt stopped him. The determination and press of rats against the skull that held them at bay told Dean that there were dozens of them on the other side of the wall. They were hungry and seemingly without any other food source. If he dug himself into a dead end, he would have no barrier between him and the hungry rodents that were determined to devour him alive.

Dean knew he could kill a few as they trickled in, but dozens would overwhelm him. He couldn't decide which was the worst way to die: eaten alive by rats, or desiccated by thirst. It wasn't beyond his comprehension either that the air was starting to thin. It was getting harder to draw a full breath, and a dull ache had formed behind his eyes that had nothing to do with hunger or thirst. He knew that if his father didn't find him soon, he was going to die either way. It was just a choice between a somewhat quick, messy death or a slow, painful one.

A young, girlish giggle echoed around the room and Dean jerked upright, just barely avoiding slamming his head against the ceiling.

A woman's voice sang an amusing ditty, but Dean could hear the underpinnings of panic in the tone. The child giggled again, and the woman shushed her.

Dean snapped on the light, panning it around the room, but he could find nothing out of place. The smears of rat blood were still on the walls, but there were no new stains. He scanned the light near his feet, his throat working hard as it settled on a small blue ball that was resting of the floor. He was certain that it hadn't been there before.

He nudged it with his toe, watching as it rolled towards the bones. He could tell it was an old toy, carved from wood, the paint chipped and peeling. The light from his torch flickered, and Dean felt a moment of panic. The small batteries in his flashlight would be giving out soon, and he would be left alone in the dark with his new bodiless friends.

"Mama, I'm afraid of the dark."

The words were loud and clear, tinged with a little girl's fear. They came from beside Dean, but there was no one in the small crypt with him.

"I know."

Dean felt his heart plummet. A soft, soothing lullaby echoed around the room. It should have been calming, even to him. The ghost that shared his space was no threat, he instinctively knew that. What caused his heart to ache was the hopelessness in the mother's voice, the lack of reassurance in her words. They were reliving the last moments of their life as they sat in the dark, waiting for death. They had moved past the feelings of hope and were drowning in acceptance. The mother knew that they were dying and that there was nothing she could do for her daughter, not even protect her with words.

He flicked off his torch, allowing the song to surround him, to comfort him like they were meant too. Exhaustion filled his body, and he drifted off into a lazy haze. Distantly, he wondered who would take care of Sammy if he wasn't around. He knew their father would protect his son, but John had a tendency to drown himself in his grief. There was no way that their Dad would stop hunting, and that would leave Sammy either alone or with other hunters. Either way, Sam would be unprotected without Dean around, and that struck something hard and cold in the center of his chest.

Dean knew he was dreaming. He knew because his senses, already finely tuned, were more taut than usual. In the background of his dream he could still hear the rats desperately trying to reach their next meal, and his ears were tuned with expectation for the sound of rescue. This bone-deep awareness didn't stop him from dreaming though, it just made the images floating through his head all that more real.

He was in a dungeon, complete with medieval torture devices and iron manacles chained to slate gray walls. He was disconnected, his senses floating on a filmy sea of lucidity. He knew that he was in a horrible place but he felt no fear, only a certain sense of despair as he slowly shuffled forward. He passed by a metal sarcophagus, his feet slipping in the tacky blood that leaked out onto the floor. Dean glanced up, meeting terror-stricken, green eyes through a narrow slat in the faceguard. As Dean watched, the faceless eyes dulled and died, leaving behind an empty soulless void where there had once been vibrant, childish life.

All around him, tortured screams echoed, and death rattles ricocheted off the gray, carved walls. Draped over a large iron wheel, a woman screamed. Her long blonde hair cascaded towards the floor in bloody strands as her back arched unnaturally over the metal braces. Rivulets of blood streamed down the inner brackets, collecting in a catch in the center of the wheel. She opened her mouth to scream, but a lullaby lisped out instead. It was stretched and broken like her body. Words were missing and the tone was nothing more than shattered bone.

Dean kept walking, his feet guiding him towards a waist-high wooden table. A small child was stretched, spread-eagle on the surface, his small body taut to the breaking point. Dean could see a mop of shaggy hair above a face covered in blood. The boy writhed, barely moving, but still determined to free himself.

He watched as a tall man, his face hooded in a leather mask, set a small metal box on the boy's bare stomach at the softest spot just above the pelvic bone. Dean stepped close enough to put his hands on the blood-soaked wood and watched as the man turned, picking up a pair of blackened metal tongs. He rooted around in a brazier of coals, searching for the hottest ones he could find.

He deposited the red embers on top of the metal box in a shallow indentation. There was a familiar squealing and the sound of tiny claws scrabbling around for purchase on metal. The boy on the table jerked, his muscles clenching along his abdomen and chest. The squealing increased, and the boy's mouth dropped open as one long scream ripped its way out of his throat.

Rivers of bright crimson blood began to stream out from beneath the box, sliding down the boy's ribs. Dean could hear wet tearing sounds beneath the boy's sobs and he shuddered in repulsion.

"Dean! Please, Dean. It's digging right through me."

Dean wrenched himself to consciousness, a starburst of agony blossoming in his skull. His entire body felt flushed with heat, and electric shocks of pain traveled up from his hands and arms to his neck and face.

He sat up, roaring like an enraged bear cub. He shook his body, throwing rats off to the wayside. He grabbed at the more tenacious ones, twisting their teeth from his flesh and throwing them against the walls of his tomb. Welts on his cheeks burned, and one rat hung onto his lower lip, its tiny claws shredding his neck in an attempt to hold on. He pried it away, ripping his lip until blood ran down his chin. He bashed the rodent into the floor before flinging its limp body at his feet.

Hot tears spurted from his eyes as he fought off the rats, killing as many as he could before they scampered through the hole. He sobbed as he pushed their little rodent corpses through the hole after their defector buddies, not wishing to share any part of his crypt with them. He twisted around to face the hole and shoved the skull back in place, holding it with both hands. He continued to sob as he laid there bleeding, his skin burning where their teeth and claws had ripped him open.

He tried to stop, tried to control the flood, knowing that his outburst would only cost him precious more liquid and oxygen that his body needed, but he couldn't. By his internal clock two days and a night had come and gone and his dad still hadn't rescued him. Hope was growing dim, and Dean feared doing the one thing that might save him. If he broke through the wall that separated him from the rats he might find freedom. Or he could very well find an agonizing death of being eaten alive.

He pressed his warm face into the cement, trying not to think of his dream. Sam stretched out on the wooden table as a rat buried its way into his innards. At that moment, in a small way Dean wanted to die. He wanted it to be over with. He was fourteen. It was unfair that he was in a situation where he would die afraid and alone. He desperately wished he was over at Kelly Fisher's house, discovering what color panties she was wearing. He wanted to be playing video games with Sam, or trying to con a sip of beer from his Dad.

He wanted to be alive and well. He wanted to be safe. He wanted to be in a well-lit sterile room where there was no possibility of rats.

"Let us out, you bastard!"

The man's guttural words bounced around the crypt, nearly deafening Dean. He hunched down, feeling a tingle at the base of his spine, as the temperature in the small space dropped dramatically. He shivered and he curled up as tightly as he could in the corner. He slipped the knife from his boot, knowing that it would be useless against a spirit, but it made him feel better none-the-less.

Something pounded against the walls, and the stone beneath Dean vibrated.

"Caleb, stop. You're scaring Emma."

The mother's voice was soothing, but its undertone was rigid with fear. A little girl sobbed, and Dean's stomach began to ache.

The realization that all three owners of the skulls had been buried alive simultaneously, both eased Dean's sorrow and made him burn with bitterness. It was wrong that they had to die, but it also made him jealous. At least they had each other in their final hours. Dean had no one but the rats to keep him company.

He hoped that the bastard Ezra would burn in Hell for what he'd done.

Dean sank further into the floor, wishing desperately that he could just fade away. He choked back his tears at the man's roar, but started sobbing softly again. He was alone, and no one could hear his cries. There was no one for him to put his game face on for. No little brother he had to protect, no father to impress. It was just him and his ghosts.

"Shush, don't cry. He likes it when you cry. He sits up top and listens. Mama says that he likes to listen to us suffer, but we shouldn't give him the satisfaction."

The tiny voice whispered in his ear, but Dean didn't jerk away. There was no use in getting his light out to scan the room. He would see nothing but bones and blood. Besides in the light he would have to face his tears, and he would rather huddle in the dark than do that. He could feel a small presence at his shoulder and he took comfort in it. He swore that if he ever did climb his way out of this hole, that he wouldn't leave her. He would salt and burn her and her family's bones, giving them the peace that they deserved, not this eternal Hell.

"I won't beg, I won't. I'm not his dog." The woman muttered, and Dean could hear madness in her voice.

She began to sing softly again, and Dean allowed himself to float away in the calm that it induced. He kept his hands firmly crossed over the skull, and he wondered whose it was; the mother that sang to him, or the man who shook the walls. Either way they protected him, and he felt reassurance in that.


	3. Chapter 3

Thank you to Starliteyes for whacking this into shape for me.

**Souls Beneath**

_Day Three_

"Caleb, no!"

A woman's screams ricocheted around the room, jerking Dean awake.

There was a steady pounding shaking the stone walls. It swelled around Dean, fighting the darkness for space. A child's sobbing could be heard beneath the roar, and the onslaught of noise echoing in the small tomb were deafening. Dean choked on the absence of air as he twisted around to face outward.

He flicked on his torch, desperately needing to see anything but darkness. Dust scattered down around his head, and Dean watched with a dull sense of horror as blood spread along the wall. He backed away, watching as it dripped to the floor in thick rivulets. The screams grew louder, and beneath that he could hear the crack of flesh on stone.

"It's too dark, too small."

A man panted in Dean's ear, and he shied away from the sound. The pulsating aura of panic gave rise to Dean's own repressed fears. It was too small, too dark in the crypt. The walls were closing in with every breath, pressing the air from his lungs until he couldn't breathe. Eventually they would squeeze the life from him, drowning him in darkness.

"I have to get out. Let me out!"

The wet sound of flesh on stone grew louder and the temperature dropped drastically.

"No, Caleb. Don't leave us alone."

Dean watched horror-stricken as plump white maggots grew out of the blood that was darkening from a bright crimson to a viscous brown sludge. The pounding was silenced, the screams dying away to soft sobs. The room warmed subtly, and Dean felt something vicious and primal grip the base of his stomach.

He stretched out a long leg, nudging the round skull resting beneath the stain with his boot. It rolled to the side, allowing him to see the crushed forefront of the skull and the broken sinus bones. Caleb, eventually driven mad by the small enclosed space, had bashed his own brains in on the wall.

The primal thing in Dean's stomach yanked hard at his innards. The visceral need to escape his prison was overwhelming. He pounded on the walls until his knuckles bled, screaming at the top of his lungs. He called for his father, for someone, anyone to help him.

Black dots danced behind his eyes, and his lungs labored to draw a breath. He collapsed beneath the stain, his cheek pressed against the grimy floor. In the torch light, a metal blade gleamed with sickening, sleek beauty. Dean reached for the knife he dropped in his panic. He gripped the smooth bone handle tightly, pulling it to his chest, refusing to sheath it. The plain steel blade offered no protection against spirits and while it may help him to kill rats, they were still trapped behind his barrier.

How much longer could he withstand the darkness and the constant fear of being eaten alive by his numerous feral bunk mates? With a shaking hand he pulled out his flask, rattling it slightly. There was no comforting slosh of liquid inside. He unscrewed the cap, tilting the flask back as far as it would go. Droplets of water dripped onto his lips, barely wetting them. He shook the flask, getting another small drop then nothing.

Pain was throbbing steadily behind his eyes, and he knew he was well on his way to dehydration. Hunger pangs wracked him through most of the night, eventually fading and leaving him with a gnawing sense of emptiness that couldn't be filled.

He knew now what drove the rats to endlessly siege him. Hunger was a desperate and instinctive motivation. They were starving and he was their only source of food other than themselves. This knowledge only served to defeat his half-formed plan to dig his way to the other side. If they were trapped, breeding and feeding amongst themselves, then there would be no freedom for him through the wall.

Thirst and hunger weakened him until he no longer could hold the skull in place. Instead he wedged his body against it, using his weight to keep it in place. He ignored the hard press of bone against his spine, finding that it was a minor inconvenience compared to everything else. The light wavered, and Dean switched it off, enveloping himself in darkness.

He could feel the presence of the child near his shoulder, and he was almost ashamed at the comfort he drew from her. He wondered if the voices were even real or if he was imagining them. Starvation and dehydration would go a long way to melting his brain until he no longer knew the difference between reality and fantasy.

Nearby, he could hear the woman crying softly, along with a sharp, grating sound that Dean identified from experience as fingernails clawing at stone.

"Please, please, Ezra. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Punish me, if you must, but not Emma. Not your daughter. She's hungry and so thirsty. Please, Ezra, please."

Dimly, Dean was aware that the exchange was important somehow, but thoughts drifted out of his mind as quickly as they came.

"You're going to die in here, you know?"

Dean's eyes snapped open as a new voice invaded his space. The comforting presence of the mother and child disappeared, leaving behind a permeating sense of evil. The darkness seemed thicker and deeper than normal, the thin air all but evaporated.

"You're going to die. Then Sammy is going to be eviscerated by some monster."

Dean clenched his eyes shut, curling his body into a tight fetal knot. His knife was pressed against his chest, and the tip pierced his skin just above the hollow of his throat. Rampant images of Sam being chased down by fur and fangs streamed endlessly through his head. Without Dean to watch his back, he was certain Sam would end up road kill for whatever monster chose to hunt him down and eat him.

He knew his Dad was a great hunter, but John's failure to find him left a void where there used to be unquestionable faith. If Sam was left with just Dad to watch his back, then one day Sam might not make it back home. What if Sam ended up in a hole in the ground, waiting long agonizing days for someone to rescue him, only to be left to die? What if Sam needed him and Dean wasn't there to save him?

Evil pressed down on him, surrounding him until Dean breathed it into his lungs like a miasma. It wanted to break him, to hear him suffer. Dean clutched the knife tighter, thinking of the little girl's words. It liked to sit up top and listen.

Suddenly, everything snapped in place for Dean. Ezra, Emma, the mother's words. Dean wasn't interred in just any tomb. He was in Ezra's family grave. His wife and daughter hadn't run out on him like legend claimed. Instead they had been his first victims. If what Emma said was true, while he was alive Ezra had liked to sit up top and listened to them as they died. That meant the ceiling had to be thin enough to break through, and for Dean to climb to the surface.

Dean opened his eyes again, staring into the darkness. The overwhelming sense of evil was still heavy in the air, but Dean's deprived brain could only concentrate on one thought at a time, and Ezra wasn't it.

His trembling fingers fumbled with the flashlight as he searched for the switch. A halo of golden light lit up the ceiling, illuminating the stone blocks. At first glance they appeared seamless, but on closer inspection, Dean could see minute cracks where separate stones were fitted together. He pulled himself as far upright as he could go, lifting his hand from his lap so he could feel along the creases. A wave of dizziness washed over him, and he hardly had the strength to keep his arms over his head.

He found a crevice just large enough for him to press his fingertips into. He tried to feel if there was air rushing through the crack, but his fingers were so numb from cold that he could barely feel the stone itself, much less anything else.

The flashlight flickered, dulling once before extinguishing. Dean smacked it against the palm of his hand, muttering half-panicked curses under his breath. It spurted back to life, but soon it died completely. Dean sighed, feeling boneless and exhausted. What he really wanted to do was close his eyes and sleep. The lure of it was intoxicating. Only the thought of falling asleep and never waking invigorated him.

Ezra's evil presence disappeared, and the mother's faint humming returned. Dean recognized instantly that something had changed. The child's presence was weaker, and the mother's sadness was immense. He listened for a few minutes before taking up his knife, feeling for the crack above his head. Once he found it, he began to dig methodically, but the weakness in his limbs forced him to take breaks often.

After what seemed to be hours later the humming was still constant, but Dean had made no headway with the crack. The stone was too solid and the thin metal of his knife tip couldn't get him the leverage he needed. His arms collapsed into his lap, his knife pointing at his feet.

"I'm sorry."

The woman's voice was fragile, and Dean closed his eyes against the darkness. He took comfort in her words even though they weren't meant for him. The spirit was caught in an endless loop of her last days, reliving the horror over and over again.

"I have to. It's for the best."

There was a soft mewling echo, along with the faint traces of a struggle. The woman sobbed beneath her breath, and Dean heard the distinct sound of choking. He sat up straighter, his wide eyes searching the darkness near his feet.

"I can't let you suffer anymore."

Slowly, Dean curled his legs up against his chest, wrapping his arms around his knees. His neck was bent awkwardly by the ceiling, but he made himself as small as possible in the corner of the crypt. He gripped the knife in his sweaty palm, acutely aware of how the cold blade pressed against his shins through the denim of his jeans.

He rocked back and forth as the tiny mewling faded away, leaving only the mother's strangled sobs. Dean pressed his face into his knees, rivers of hot tears soaking through his pants. Eventually all that was left was the sound of his sniffling, the mother fading away into nothingness. Dean wondered how long before the next cycle began, how long it would be before she would have to murder her child again?

Dean thought of his own mother. There was so little he remembered about her. He knew she had golden hair, and it was softest thing he had ever touched. Even softer than his stuffed dog he slept with nightly. She smelled of lavender, and was warm like sunshine. She always smiled at him. Even when he was bad and she scolded him, he could see the smile behind her eyes.

When Dean thought of his mom, he thought of love. Unconditional, unprecedented love. Even as a tiny child, he knew without a doubt the woman who held him, rocked him, soothed his tears was committed to him. There had never been any doubt his mommy would have given him anything, all he had to do was ask and she provided. She told him she loved him with every caress on his rounded cheek, to the way she tussled his hair when he got under her feet.

He wondered if that love would have extended to murdering him. Would his mother have wrapped her delicate hands around his small throat to save him from his suffering? Would he rather his mother let him die a natural death of starvation and thirst? Would he rather die choking on thin air? Dean gripped his knife tighter. Did he want to open his throat and bleed out in seconds?

He heard a rustling sound down by his feet and knew the rats were pushing on his barrier again. It was unattended, and they were determined to have their meal. Dean felt lethargic, barely able to move from his seated position, much less fight off another legion of hungry rodents.

Dean pulled the knife closer to him. Afraid that if he loosened his grip he wouldn't be able to find the strength to pick it back up.

"They're going to eat you alive, bury their little noses deep in your belly, and feast on your intestines while you scream."

Dean rocked away from the voice, sobbing. He dragged the knife up his leg until it rested on his bent knees. He couldn't see past the darkness and for once he was grateful. He didn't want to see the cold gleam of metal, or the thin line of the blade. He twisted his wrist, sliding the knife under his chin until the razor sharp edge rested against his throat.

"You're going to die here, and your suffering will join their sweet song."

His entire body shook with tremors, and the cold sting of metal nicked his flesh. Blood welled up from the wound, hot rivers of it rolling down his neck onto his chest.

He wished he was home, wrestling with Sam on the dirty carpet in front of the TV as they watched old Kung Fu movies. He wished his Dad was in the next room, searching for a hunt while dryly critiquing his sons on their skills.

He wished to God his mother was there to help him hold the blade of the knife steady in his trembling hand.


	4. Chapter 4

As always, a heartfelt thanks to Starliteyes for looking this over for me.

**Souls Beneath**

_Day three and a half_

John lost his son. Somewhere between his thoughts of '_my boy is growing into a man,'_ and _'oh my fucking God, no'_, John had lost him to the dark depths of a malicious ghost's embrace.

His dark eyes were bloodshot with lack of sleep, and his grizzled beard was showing more gray than it had three days prior. He was standing in the room where he lost Dean, wearing the same clothes, coated in more grime. He stared through the broken wall at the massive, moss-draped tree that twisted its way inside. The tree was huge. John could walk out the gaping hole on the second floor and onto the wide limbs if he wanted to. Past the shadows of the crumbling mansion, twisting vines and thick branches the sinking sun was painting the sky in violent hues of orange and red. The colors of fire. The colors of loss.

John's nails were ragged from when he had thrown aside the shovel in favor of using his hands to dig holes in the hard-packed root cellar. The backs of his hands were scratched by the wood paneling he had torn from the walls. Somewhere in the house there had to be a hidden room, a secret passage of some kind. Dean had to be there, locked beneath the mahogany wood floor or behind a brick wall he hadn't found yet. He _had_ to be somewhere close.

A trembling started deep inside John. It started over his heart, spreading through his body, hitting him hardest at the knees. Three days with barely enough food or water to keep his breakneck pace washed over him in a wave of weakness. Of their own volition his knees kicked forward, joints giving way, slamming him into the floor.

He continued to stare sightlessly through the branches, his vision blurring for no reason he wanted to acknowledge. Something hot and wet scalded his cheeks, but he ignored it. He remembered another time when he faced the colors of red and orange, felt heart-wrenching pain in the center of his chest--- held reminders of loss in his arms in the form of two small children.

He rocked forward, planting his scraped knuckles on the hardwood floor. Bile raged in the deep, empty pit of his stomach and he knew he was perilously close to dry heaving. For not the first time he thought his life was too dangerous for children. Deep down a part of him had always known he should have left them behind when he started his crusade. Rambling mansions haunted by murderous ghosts and dark midnight forests stalked by werewolves were no places for his boys to be. But fear loomed larger than embittered knowledge. The fear that by leaving them behind, they would be unprotected. Giving away his children was paramount to serving them upon a silver platter for any monster to come along and devour them. And how could he? How could he leave behind the only thing left in the world that mattered to him? How could he leave behind the only pieces of Mary he had left? At least he was able to train them to fight, teach them to survive, protect them---

John slammed his fists into the floor. Repeatedly striking the hard wood until his knuckles cracked and his skin split apart. Boards shattered under the blows, splintering and caving inward. A raw, desperate roar ripped from his throat, echoing around the room. Birds screeched in the rafters, flying away from their perches in a flurry of wings and molting feathers. The sound of his cry reverberated in his skull, knifing his brain as punishment long after it died away.

John leaned forward, resting his brow against his bloody fists. The sun slipped beneath the horizon, turning the sky from fire into coal. Darkness descended, and the shadows crept up to nestle next to his heart.

The sound died down in John's head, knocked away by a persistent beeping. He clenched his empty hands tighter, rubbing his face up his arm along the coarse canvas of his well-worn jacket before sitting back on his heels. Coldness settled over his impassive features, and the father in him receded, replaced by the soldier. He stood up fast, blinking away the dizziness that swept through him. With quick efficiency he snapped open his phone, his voice dry and sterile.

"Yah?"

"_Dad! Dad! I think I've figured it out!"_

John's paralyzed heart stuttered to life in his chest as he listened to his little boy's shrill voice. Too smart for his own good, at the age of ten Sam was damn near the best researcher in all fifty states. His skills when he applied them about put Bobby to shame. The problem was getting his son to apply them. Old enough now to realize hunting wasn't a game, Sam very rarely wanted anything to do with the family business. For now he did as his father ordered, but John could see problems brewing on the horizon.

"What is it Sam?" John asked sharply, trying to shut out the spike of hope that stabbed his heart. It had been three days since Dean went missing. Hope, at this point, was a very dangerous thing.

"_I found something at the library_."

Unable to help hunt for Dean, because no matter how much he screamed, wheedled or whined, his father was firm on the matter that he was to go nowhere near the plantation, Sam turned to his one true talent---research. He buried himself in histories and old ledgers from the library. He spent every second from the moment it opened to when it closed down in the archives. He went even so far as pilfering references, stuffing them in his backpack before closing to take back to his house to read.

"_I found a letter from the reverend's wife to her sister in the next county. It says here__she never believed that Mable Cane up and left her husband to run off with her lover. She was Mable's closest friend, and she swears up and down in the letter that she would have known if Mable was going to run off_."

"I don't see how that helps us, son." John's already crisp tone sliced razor wire sharp through the phone. Sam's quick intake of air made him instantly regret it. His youngest son didn't deserve all the self-loathing John felt inside, directed at him. Sam needed to hear confidence; he needed to believe his brother was coming home, even if John already knew the possibility of that happening was almost nil.

The first day Dean went missing, acid burned pits into his stomach, but he had been determined. Despair hadn't wormed its way into his gut, and his voice was resolute over the phone when he called his youngest son to tell him the news. After that everything became about Dean. The world stopped spinning, and everything fell off its axis. The only thing they lived and breathed for was to find Dean. Find Dean before it was too late. Find Dean before all there was left to find was a waxy corpse to salt and burn.

One of the hardest things John had ever done in his life was tell his four year-old boy that he would never see his mother again. It had been next to impossible explaining something like that to a young child. The look of abandonment and confusion etched over such tiny features was enough to break even the most hardened soldier's heart. John knew why Dean clung so tightly to him and his brother. His feelings of abandonment never completely evaporated. A small part of Dean was still waiting for his mother to come home. A toddler just wasn't capable of understanding death, but they could comprehend rejection. Even as a teenager, Dean knew it was illogical, but he still wondered what he had done wrong to make his mother leave him.

The second hardest thing John ever done was explain to his ten year-old son his older brother wouldn't be coming home that night. Unlike Dean, Sam was old enough to understand loss, and more importantly he was able to assign blame for that loss. And as far as his youngest son was concerned, fault lay squarely at his father's feet. John couldn't really say he disagreed with him. How it was possible his child had been stolen away right in front of him was something he was still trying to come to terms with. He felt impotent and useless. That impotency translated into anger and rigid, uncompromising determination to find his son, even if it meant ripping down the ancient homestead and digging up every square inch of land.

"_I know, but dad, I found another reference in a farmhand's journal. It says here that around the time of Mable Cane's disappearance, Ezra began visiting his family crypt daily, spending long hours in there._" Sam's voice was full of earnest pleading, and John felt the urge to crumple to his knees again.

"Bobby has already checked the family plot."

Bobby had shown up the second day of Dean's disappearance. Spooked by the veiled panic in his friend's voice when John called, he packed up his truck and high-tailed it to Georgia, driving non-stop through the day and most of the night. Since arriving he hadn't stopped either; instead he scoured the grounds, digging holes, looking for hidden caches.

Behind the house, nestled against the woods was an old family cemetery, encircled by a collapsing wrought iron fence threaded with vines. Inside the fence were a couple of crumbling mausoleums and several aboveground tombs. Bobby had checked them over first, but he found no sign of recent spectral activity on his EMF, and time was of the essence.

"_Please, dad. I think Dean might be there. Please, daddy, you have to find him._"

_When's mommy coming home, daddy?_

John fisted his hand in his shirt above his heart, falling backwards half a step into the wall. His knees sagged under the enormous weight pressing on his broad shoulders and he could hear the dry peeling sound of old wallpaper as it scraped off on his back. He opened his mouth to speak, but the words shriveled up and died in his throat. He coughed, covering up his shuddering breaths with the harsh sound. Finally he found the will to force words out of his mouth.

"Okay, son. I'll take Bobby over there, right now."

"_Thanks, dad. I know you'll find him. I know you will."_

Before he could reply, before he could set the expectation that his older brother just might not be coming back, Sam hung up. John had never been more thankful for anything in his life. He didn't know how he was going to tell Sam Dean was gone.

Three days without food and water. Three days, trapped fuck knows where. Three days with a dwindling air supply. The chance Dean was still alive was small at best. John swallowed the hard lump in his throat, squaring his shoulders resolutely before going outside to search for Bobby.

He found him in the backyard, digging another deep hole near the tree line inside a pool of yellow light cast by his camping lantern. John waved him over with a bob of flashlight as he walked dejectedly towards the cemetery. Bobby fell in step beside him, his blue eyes shading gray with remorse. Already his friend had given up, and John was feeling the same heavy despair pressing on his chest. John knew he would eventually unearth his son, but it was drawing to the time when he would find a corpse, not a living, breathing child.

"Sam has a theory," John offered in a way of explanation.

Bobby nodded in acceptance. Although he had already checked the mausoleums, he offered no resistance. There was no reason to say no to his friend. No reason to deny him his feeble attempts.

Bobby set his lamp on a high shelf by the door and withdrew his EMF to scan the crypt as soon as they entered. Brass plaques were bolted to the walls above upright coffins nearly falling apart with age. It was a small hexagon space with only three rotted skeletons, Ezra's parents and sister, his only family besides his wife and daughter.

Bobby rubbed a hand over his sweaty brow as he walked a half circle in the dusty interior. He had been digging holes nearly non-stop since yesterday, and his arms were ready to fall off at the shoulders. His entire body was fatigued with wear and hunger. Blisters burned his hands and tremors wracked his arms. Even the effort to lift his feet to walk was exhausting. He tripped over a crack, watching as the EMF fell from his numb fingertips. It clattered onto to the floor where it squealed like a stuck pig.

Both John and Bobby nearly jumped out of their skins as they stared down at the small black box on the ground, the red bulbs at the top of the meter flaring up.

"Under the floor," John breathed in bewilderment. Frantically he dropped to his knees pounding on the cobblestone slabs with his bare fists.

Bobby regained his senses sooner, and darted from the crypt, racing to his truck. John chased after him, jumping into the bed of his pickup to dig out a sledgehammer and pick axe. Back at the crypt they hammered the floor, shattering the flat stones.

They broke through the floor soon enough, and John dropped down to one knee, peeling back slabs of stone. A plague of rats exploded from the small opening, screeching and squealing, flipping around on the floor as they stampeded over each other. Their rank musky scent choked the hot, humid air, gagging John and Bobby. The rodents cascaded over their feet, driving both men towards the entrance as they washed out the door in a brown, furry wave.

John and Bobby scattered them further, stomping some into the floor and swinging at others with their heavy tools. They fought their way back to the hole, yanking away more stone as quickly as possible. John grabbed his flashlight, ducking his head inside to peer into the pit. All he could see in the dark depths were piles and piles of yellowed, gnawed upon bones. There were hundreds heaped up, going who knew how deep. John expelled a tiny grunt of despair, which had Bobby looking at him sharply.

Bobby repositioned himself, throwing his weight behind the hammer as he pounded a new section of flooring. John scrambled to help, prying away more stone with the flat edge of the axe. They quickly unearthed a second small chamber mercifully free of rats. John swept a small section of the pit with his flashlight, seeing a small collection of bones and a dozen rat corpses.

"Dean!" he shouted, knowing, _hoping_ his son was there.

They knelt, using their hands to pry up stones so their blows wouldn't rain heavy slabs down on Dean's head. After widening the hole John ducked his head inside, using his flashlight to scan the tiny space beneath the floor.

His breath caught in his throat as he glimpsed his son, slumped against the far wall. His dark lashes formed crescent smudges on his cheeks, his freckles standing out starkly against his pale skin. Something hot and strangled rose up in John's chest, threatening to steal his air away. He clawed at the floor, flinging the thick stone slabs aside like a man possessed. Bobby helped him break away more rock until the opening was large enough for John to slip inside the tomb where his son lay.

"Dean?"

John squatted inside the pit, reaching awkwardly under the floor to grip a handful of filthy, stiff denim. He tightened his fist in Dean's pant leg, dragging him closer. Dean slid down the wall, his head thumping painfully on the floor. The hot, hard knot in John's chest grew until it was pressing painfully against the underside of his sternum when Dean didn't so much as flutter in protest.

"Dean, open your eyes, son."

John dragged Dean across the grimy floor, winding one arm under his waist when he was near enough. He levered Dean into a sitting position, grimacing at his boneless body and slack mouth. John hauled Dean out of the pit, Bobby helping to lift him. John scrambled out and gently they laid him down on the floor.

There were smears of blood all over Dean's hands and face, especially around his mouth. Slivers of wood were jammed beneath his nails from his struggle with the poltergeist in the hall. Some of his nails were peeled away from the beds, and John swallowed hard at what that meant, knowing it wasn't from the initial fight. Along with those wounds he could see jagged bites along Dean's hands and arms. More ragged injuries were on his lips and cheeks.

John set his teeth, his jaw flexing with strain as he reached his fingers beneath his son's chin. He withdrew quickly when he felt the sticky wetness of blood. He tilted Dean's head back on his neck, noticing more bite marks and tiny, clean nicks in his flesh. John's eyes flickered down to where Dean's favorite knife was tightly clenched in a white-knuckled grip.

The hot thing inside John expanded until it felt like breathing would soon become impossible. Acidic bile rushed up his throat, burning his molars at the roots. John searched desperately for a pulse, _needing_ to know that his son was alive. When he felt a faint flutter against his fingertips the breath he had been unconsciously holding gushed out his lungs, and the hard white panic in John's chest loosened its clawed grip.

"He's alive."

John heard the raw pitch in his tone, but for once he forgave himself for the weakness. This was his _son_, and he was _alive_. Dean had been buried alive for three days, fought off hordes of hungry rats, and who knew what else. His son was alive, and John meant to keep him that way.

John pried the knife away from Dean's iron-fisted grip, handing it to Bobby before hauling him up in his arms, hugging his boy to his chest. He could feel his son's faint, shivering breaths against his neck, and reflexively John clenched his grip, bringing Dean even closer to his heart. Heat burned behind his eyes, and briefly he squeezed them closed before struggling to his feet. Absently, he wondered when his little boy had grown into a hundred and twenty pound limp bag of rice, but he endured the weight happily. John hustled back to his truck, allowing Bobby to help him situate Dean in the front seat before the man split off to get into his own truck. John crawled behind the wheel, lifting his son's head so it was cradled in his lap.

John started the engine, backing out of the drive almost recklessly. He made a three point turn, cursing loudly when the back wheels spun in the mud before catching on bedrock. He sped down the overgrown dirt track, the truck bouncing dangerously in and out of the deep ruts.

"Dad?"

John jerked his eyes off the road, glancing down at the most beautiful sight ever: his son's green eyes looking up at him. Dean's face was pale beneath the blood around his lips, and John could count the freckles sprinkled across his nose. For just a moment, Dean was four again, looking up at him with sad, confused eyes, asking him when Mommy would be coming home.

John reached into the door pocket, pulling out a camouflaged canteen filled with water. He unscrewed the cap with his teeth, keeping one hand on the wheel, and half an eye on the road.

"Son, you're going to be alright now. I'm taking you to the hospital. You're dehydrated and a little malnourished, but you're okay."

John helped Dean take small sips from the can, making sure that he didn't swallow too much. He didn't mention the bite wounds, but the way Dean touched his raw fingers to his ravaged lips, he figured that he didn't have to.

"You found me."

It was a statement, but it sounded so much like a question that it nearly broke John's heart.

"Of course, I did, Dean. I'll always find you," John swore, and he wondered if there was special Hell for liars or if parents were exempt. John wanted desperately to keep the promises he swore to his sons, but like all adults he knew sometimes such assurances just weren't possible. Sam was still young enough to believe his father's promises, and up until three days ago, Dean had been as well. But as John stared down into his son's clouded bloodshot eyes, he knew that time had passed.

Dean nodded, looking away in the distance. The hot thing in John's chest returned with a vengeance. It threatened to spill out his eyes in hot wet bursts, and he had to swallow it back down into the pit of his stomach.

"I found you, Dean. I did. That bastard can't get you anymore. I'm going to go back there and burn the whole damn place to the ground."

Dean closed his eyes and John watched as his son swallowed hard.

"Dad, promise me that when you go back, you'll salt and burn the remains in the crypt."

John tightened his knuckles around the wheel, staring straight ahead.

"Dean, did—did something happen? Something besides Ezra?"

John's eyes flickered down to his son, and he watched as Dean shifted his knees against his chest, curling in on himself.

"Just promise me, Dad. They didn't deserve that. No one deserves that."

"Okay, son. I promise."

His words seemed to relax Dean a fraction, and he almost jumped when his son wrapped a weak hand around his calf, clutching at him the only way he could. Dean stared at his other hand, flexing his fingers so he could see the crusts of blood crack in the crevices of his knuckles. John scrambled for something else to say, knowing that his son needed to hear the reassuring sound of his voice.

"Sam's sure is going to be happy to see you. He's the one who cracked the case, you know."

"Of course he did." John heard a hint of a smile in Dean's voice and he felt himself loosen just a bit.

"I think the little do-gooder stole books from the library so he could study them at home. You'd think he actually likes his big brother, despite how much he says to the contrary."

"Yah, the little shit is going to freak when he sees me."

"Language, son." John reprimanded softly, the rest of his panic slipping away. Once Dean was in the hospital, got some intravenous fluids in him, and the bite wounds tended to, he would be alright. His little boy would be just fine.

"Hey, Dad?"

"Yeah?" John glanced down to see Dean looking intently at his hands again.

"Let's not tell Sammy about the rats."

Dean paused and John waited a heartbeat, his stomach doing little flips of indecision.

"I mean. He's already freaked out enough about clowns as it is."

John pressed his lips together, taking one hand off the wheel to run his fingers through his son's short hair. He heard Dean's sigh of contentment, and the hand that gripped his calf loosened slightly.

John knew that some fears were innate. Men fear the dark because instinctively they know there are things out there that hunt them where they can't see. Some fears are born through tragedy and trauma, like the paralyzing terror of loss. No man is fearless, nor should he be. Fear is what hones the senses and sharpens instinct. Fear is what drives man, and fear is what must be conquered.

"We all have something, son."

John brushed his hand through his son's hair one last time, before wrapping his fingers around the wheel, driving hell-bent away from both their fears.

FINISHED


End file.
